Thursday, December 16, 2010

This is where it all began. I started as a busboy, pops tried to instill a good work ethic by making me clean toilets, but I just paid the dishwasher to do it and took home the difference cause papa didn't raise no fool. These hands is made for counting money dad, not toilet bowls, act like you know.

I'm comin home December 26th from 6pm to 11pm serving the haus bao and bao fries. COME GET SOME. 8801 International Drive right next to Howl at the Moon. Yes, its in a mini-mall. Not G-shit.

Peep the video to watch evan smile like a pitchman and say pause worthy things like: "All swallowed and consumed in 60 minutes." HAHA. Now yall know why Prince Inappropriate was kicked out of the Huang Family Biz. They built the wall to keep me out, I swear.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Baohaus is 1 years old next week. This photo is from 3rd grade. It was some sort of elementary school career day and I went as a "chef". My pops owned restaurants and they all wore these hats there. We were lazy so with no intentions of ever being a chef, I threw on the hat and went to school. 25 years later... Pops, we came up, WHAT WHAT makin it happen... from yongkang to rivington, we goin platinum.

Couldn't have done it without my family: Emery, Evan, Mom, Dad and Wong Wong! Yall are the best. I want to say thank you to every one who has supported us from Day 1. From neighbors to customers to writers to other cooks, your support really made it happen. As a thanks to everyone, $1 chairman, jesses, and birdhaus baos all day Monday December 20th!

For those who haven't followed the blog from day 1, this was a pipedream. I was laid off from Chadbourne & Parke in 2009 (great firm, much love) and started hustlin like it was 2001 again. I sat around the park "workin" and playin ball all day and would do comedy shows at night. Even though I was a bit "lost", it was one of the best years of my life. Ning and Steve would come to all the comedy shows, film my stupid bits, and we sent a tape and the haus bao recipe to the Food Network for URS.

I heard back from High Noon in July that I made the cut for URS, lost on the show in October and opened Baohaus in December '09. 6 months later, we signed with High Noon cause we loyal mother fuckers. 2010... I love you. I wanted to recap what happened, but it's kinda OD. Here are some quick hits.

1) Hotboxed the haus with neighbors in the joint
2) Shanked a neighbor who tried to punch me for free bao fries
3) Got hot tea thrown on me by a pregnant chick for not letting her use the bathroom (cause its illegal)
4) Hit a drunk fool with a can of condensed milk for pushing down a delivery girl.
5) Chairman Bao jockin my style
6) Four Loko ruined my life
7) Won Best Bun in NY
8) Mr. Town & Country - still the most hilarious honor we have ever received. ruv it.
9) Introduced Manhattan to the Taiwanese Lush Life
10) Met a lot of dope chefs and ingredients but Raekwon and headband are still my favorite.

Thank yous are in order

Sarah Di Gregorio/Rebecca Marx from the Village Voice - yall found baohaus first and let the interwebs know. Respect. That article is from Rebecca, but I'm pretty sure Sarah did a post just saying we were open on christmas eve...

Ligaya and Ahrin Mishan - thank you! I didn't know who Ligaya was when she came to eat but I hung out with Ahrin and the fam for a while eating peanuts. Life really changed after that $25 and under review. The day of the review, Asa and I showed up to work and there was already a line. We called in Simon and didn't stop till 6pm.

Danielle Chang and Frances from TVBS are really responsible for introducing us to Taiwan. After the above demo and the TVBS piece, we got in touch with a lot of old friends from Taiwan. To this day, my parents' favorite press hit is the World Journal that they got at the Chinese Grocery store haha.

Eater - to all the homies at eater: greg, raphael, yall are the best. keep it funky in 2011

Sam Sifton - thanks for the ass whoopin'. i thought asian discipline at home was bad, but it's definitely worse in print haha. for real, thanks.

Shopsin Family - Kenny, Zack, Luke ... still my favorite restaurant in the LES. Kenny's like the yoda of the food game for me. Dude always knows what to say. Zack, two words: vegan enchiladas.

Francis Lam - thanks for takin a photo of me with Statue of Liberty Jesus

Jenny Miller - supported us from day 1, had chinese new year dinner with us, stay on ur grizz girl.

Simon Tung - thank you for bringing moutai to above party so that I ended up shirtless on the street in December... Awesome. Workin at baohaus since day 1, Simon's been family for a minute. Simon now has Macaron Parlour so peep that.

Steven Lau - this dude's been my right hand for the last half decade. we started hoodman together with ning, he worked at baohaus, and ate the first bao we ever served....(photo above)